


even heroes

by theglitterati



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Beating, Developing Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mugging, Otabek Altin Whump, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-01
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:00:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22964299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theglitterati/pseuds/theglitterati
Summary: Otabek is mugged on his way home to Yuri.
Relationships: Otabek Altin/Yuri Plisetsky
Comments: 5
Kudos: 79
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	even heroes

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from "Superman" by Five For Fighting.

The second-worst thing about getting jumped is that Otabek doesn’t know why it’s happening. Do they want money? If they do, there are better places to find it and better people to find it on. He doesn’t even have a credit card. Is it because he’s Kazakh? Otabek is one of the most internationally-recognizable Kazakh people, but only among figure skating fans, which these men are decidedly not. Or are they just drunk and hungry to fight, and Otabek was the first unlucky soul to cross their path on the deserted street?

The worst thing about getting jumped is how much it _hurts._

Otabek hears their footsteps behind him, innocuous at first, then closer, then too close. By the time he realizes, with a sinking feeling in his stomach, that something’s wrong, it’s too late. He turns around, and is met with one of their fists crashing into his face, sending needles of pain through his jaw. 

There are two men — not boys, like him, but full-fledged adults, with beards and liquor on their breath. It’s just the two of them and him, and not a single other person on the dark Petersburg street. His heart beats faster. Should he defend himself, or try to run? He’s still thinking about it when the second blow lands.

He covered his jaw instinctively after the first, so this punch, thrown by the other man, hits his cheek, glancing off the bone. He tries to stagger back, hands raised to protect his face, but they just keep going. The next hit catches him on the ear. His hearing goes fuzzy for a minute, but it doesn’t matter; the men aren’t saying anything. What do they even want?

He manages to dodge the fifth punch, ducking back from the man’s swinging fist. Maybe he can fight back, he realizes. There’s two of them, but he’s a professional athlete. He’s the Hero of Kazakhstan, for god’s sake. He can do this.

He does his best to compartmentalize the pain searing through his head and charges at the bigger of the two, arm raised. He gets him in the chin, a solid hit that sends him back a few feet. But it takes all of his focus to do it, which means that when the second man comes at him, Otabek doesn’t seem him coming, and when he hits him like a boulder, Otabek realizes he mistakenly conflated size with strength. He hits the pavement hard, pebbles digging into his back through his hoodie.

He tries to right himself, but the big guy has recovered, and both of them are on their feet. It only takes a second for the first kick to slam into Otabek’s stomach. He immediately feels both nauseous and short of breath, like he’s either going to be sick or asphyxiate. 

It is so, so much worse than falling on the ice. On the ice, his hand doesn’t bleed where the cement scraped it, pieces of sand sticking to the wound. On the ice, he can get up, and try again. Here, he isn’t getting up. When they kick him in the stomach the second time, he knows it is over.

Except, unfortunately, though the ability to fight back has left him, it stays with his attackers. Otabek curls up into the fetal position as best as he can, tucking in his knees to protect his stomach and raising his arms to save his face. A voice that sounds nothing like his comes out of his mouth, begging them to _please, please, stop_. He just wants to get back to Lilia’s apartment, back to Yuri. He just wants it to end.

Then one of them — with his eyes squeezed tight enough that colours blossom behind them, he can’t see which — gives him a final, hard kick in the shin. The other digs through his pockets. They take everything he has: a few hundred rubles, his phone, some gum, and the chocolate bar Yuri sent him to the store to buy. When they’re satisfied there’s nothing left, they take off.

Otabek lies in the street for a long time, waiting until the aching in his body subsides enough that he can move. The area’s still deserted; Lilia’s apartment, where he’s staying with Yuri while she’s on vacation, is in a part of Petersburg that’s busy in the day, but deserted at night, and even more so now, at eleven p.m. on a Sunday. Not a single person passes by to help him.

Finally, Otabek manages to push himself onto his hands and knees. His vision swims. His stomach turns. But he gets to his feet and leans against the nearest building, taking stock.

There’s barely a spot on him they didn’t batter — his shins, his stomach. But his head hurts the most. He can barely open his mouth without sending a searing pain through his jaw. His left eye is nearly swollen shut.

Positives, if there are any: he’s pretty sure nothing’s broken. He cracked a rib once, and he remembers how it felt, and there’s none of that pain in his chest now. Also, the men are gone, and he’s only three blocks from Lilia’s. From Yuri. He has to get to him. He starts walking, slowly, wincing with every step.

“What took you so long?” Yuri’s voice rings tinnily through the intercom. Otabek doesn’t answer, just waits for the buzz that tells him the door is open, then resigns himself to climbing the flight of stairs in front of him.

“Final— Beka?!” Yuri’s on him the second he opens the door. “What the fuck happened to you?”

“Two guys,” is all he is able to say.

“Oh fuck. Oh fuck!” He can hear the panic in Yuri’s voice. It makes him sound younger. “Sit down. Do you need to go to hospital?”

Otabek sinks into the couch, shaking his head. “No.” He probably does, but he wants more than anything just to stay here, where no one but Yuri can touch him.

“Did they rob you?” Yuri asks.

Otabek nods. “My phone.” Thank god he had a password on it. “Your chocolate bar.”

Yuri flops down next to him, placing a hand on his back. “I don’t care about a fucking chocolate bar. I should never have sent you to get the fucking thing! This wouldn’t have happened—!” Otabek doesn’t look up, but he sounds close to tears.

“Not your fault,” Otabek mumbles.

“How do I make you better? Just tell me, and I’ll do it.”

“I don’t know,” Otabek says. Yuri always expects him to know everything because he’s older. But he doesn’t exactly have experience with this. “Can you help me to the bathroom?” He needs to see himself. Yuri takes his hand and leads the way.

They both gasp when Yuri turns on the light. The Hero of Kazakhstan’s handsome face is a mosaic of bruises and blood. Thank god it isn’t skating season. His left eye has closed completely, the skin surrounding it purple and puffy. Bruises have already bloomed along both sides of his jaw; a cut bisects the ones on his right cheek. His lip is cut, too; he must have bitten it at some point, because the teeth marks are clearly visible.

“Beka…” Yuri says.

“I’m fine,” Otabek says ridiculously. “I think I should take a shower.” He steps back from the sink, intending to turn on the water in the shower, and stumbles. Yuri has to catch him before he hits the floor.

“You can’t take a shower like this,” Yuri chastises him. “You’ll pass out and hit your head and die.” He looks at Lilia’s huge clawfoot tub, then looks back at Otabek meaningfully.

“I…” Otabek begins to protest, but Yuri silences him with a look. “Fine.”

Yuri nods once, happy he’s won. He doesn’t move.

“Um. Are you going to leave?”

“What, so you can pass out and drown? No fucking way.” He turns on the taps, dipping his fingers in to test the temperature. It’s a loving gesture, one that makes Otabek feel too warm in the cold bathroom. “Now get in.”

Otabek hesitates with his hand on the hem of his shirt.

“Oh, don’t be fucking shy now, Beka. I’ve seen you in the locker room before.” And in his room, late at night, but it’s always been dark. “Just take off your clothes.”

Otabek acquiesces, but when he goes to pull off his t-shirt, the pain in his stomach makes him double-over. “Can’t,” he grunts.

Yuri comes closer without a word and helps him out of his shirt, then kneels down on the ground in front of him. Otabek is about to ask what he’s doing when Yuri starts untying his shoes. He didn’t realize he was still wearing them. Once he has them off, Yuri slips his sweatpants and underwear off, giving Otabek a hand to hold as he steps out of them and into the tub.

Yuri lets him struggle to wash himself for a minute before sighing and taking the soap from him, working it all over his body. His own t-shirt gets wet as he splashes water over Otabek’s shoulders; it clings to this body. Otabek winces when he passes over sore spots, but Yuri’s touch is light and gentle. It still stings, though, when Yuri washes his hands. The scrapes on the right one are worse, but both are bleeding, and both have little stones embedded in them. Yuri removes them with surprisingly elegant long nails. Then he’s tipping Otabek’s head back to wash his hair, and Otabek protests at first, because god, the cut on his chin stings like hell. But Yuri hovers about him, the tips of his hair trailing in the water, his face ringed with light like an angel, and Otabek finally unclenches. He relaxes into the bath, letting Yuri work.

Yuri’s fingers dance across his cheeks, careful to keep soap out of his eyes, and then out of nowhere, he bends down and places a kiss to Otabek’s forehead. They’ve kissed before, but they never talk about it, even when they wake up in bed together, sweaty and satisfied. It’s never been like this before, never in the light.

“I think you are okay now,” Yuri says, and Otabek feels like he will be.

Yuri helps him into clean clothes, both of them avoiding the fact that he’s naked and wet. He lets Yuri lead him to the bedroom.

They share Yuri’s double bed whenever Otabek visits. He expects Yuri to crawl in next to him as usual, but he helps Otabek settle in and then leaves the room. He returns a moment later with a cloth and a bottle of vodka.

“I don’t want to drink,” Otabek says.

“Would probably help,” Yuri suggests, “but it’s not for drinking.” He perches on the bed and pours some vodka onto the cloth. “This is going to sting like a bitch,” he warns, before pressing the cloth to Otabek’s jaw.

Otabek can’t help himself; he cries out in pain. It feels like his face is on fire.

“Sorry,” Yuri says, though he doesn’t seem sorry at all. “You don’t know what those nasty bastards had on their hands. You can’t get an infection.”

Just when the stinging starts to subside, Yuri pulls the cloth away, wets it again, and sticks it on Otabek’s right palm. He jerks involuntarily, but Yuri’s grip on his wrist is firm. “Don’t fight,” Yuri mumbles, and Otabek forces himself not to.

He does the other hand, which isn’t as bad, then leaves again. Otabek wonders vaguely what torture he’ll bring back with him this time. He feels exhausted.

Yuri comes back with an ice pack wrapped in a towel. This he gives to Otabek to hold. “For your eye.” He turns out the light and lies down beside him.

Yuri doesn’t leave space between them tonight like he normally does at first; he closes the gap right away and settles himself against Otabek’s side. They lay together, not speaking, until Otabek puts the ice pack down on the night table.

“Beka,” Yuri asks in a small voice, “are you okay?”

And no, he’s really not, and all of a sudden he’s shaking, and then the tears start to fall, pouring over his cheeks uncontrollably. Yuri’s staring at him, eyes bulging, because since when does Otabek Altin cry? He can’t cry, he can’t, because he’s the Hero of Kazakhstan, but also because crying fucking _hurts_ , his black eye stinging and his already puffy face swelling even more. And yet it’s happening anyway, loud sobs escaping his chest. He holds on to Yuri so tightly that in the morning, he’ll have bruises of his own.

“You’re okay, now,” Yuri mumbles into his ear.

“I was so scared,” Otabek gasps. “I thought I was going to die.”

Yuri holds him even closer. “You’re okay. Don’t be sad,” he says, but his tone tells Otabek it’s okay if he is.

 _You’re okay_ , he repeats, over and over until Otabek believes it. Yuri strokes his head in the same way he strokes his cat’s, and it’s cute, and funny enough to finally make Otabek stop crying. He pulls Yuri in close and presses a kiss to his mouth. It’s deliberate, and delicate, so unlike everything else they’ve been doing in this bed. “Thank you,” he whispers. He gets a second kiss in return, then Yuri rests his head on Otabek’s chest. Otabek listens to the sound of his breathing until he falls asleep. 

It’s funny, Otabek thinks, as he himself drifts off, that after what happened with those two men, being wrapped up in this ninety-pounds-soaking-wet cherub of a boy is what makes him feel safe.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at kyrstin.tumblr.com.


End file.
